MOVIE: Kung Fu Panda (2008)

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Kung Fu PandaYear: 2008Rating: PGLength: 92 minutes / 1.53 hours Many people give animated films flack for being directed at children. DreamWorks movies have historically leaned toward the younger demographic with plenty of fart jokes while still having the occasional adult jokes sprinkled throughout. The problem with discounting the medium on the whole is that there are some things it can do very well. Kung Fu Panda (2008) not only has a great message about playing to our strengths, but it also uses the fact that it's animated to present some extremely well-done kung fu fights. Jack Black brings Kung Fu Panda to life with Po, the kung fu obsessed panda who doesn't fit the physical model needed to practice the martial art. Despite being chosen as the next Dragon Warrior, Po must learn kung fu so he can protect the land from one of the most dangerous practitioners of the fighting style. It's important for kids to see that he struggles...
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BOOK: Infected (2008)

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Infected Year: 2008 Author: Scott Sigler Length: 684 minutes / 11.4 hours Stephen King has written most of the horror I’ve read. In deciding to branch out from the master of the genre, I saw the cover for this book in the listing of audiobooks for my library’s reader app and thought it looked interesting. While the horror here was more body/gross-out horror—which I didn’t have any issue with—there are other, deeper problems with this book. I’ll grant that in terms of audiobooks, it was an interesting recording with the sound effects and “alien voice” bits. However, I can’t say I recommend this book based on those merits alone. Perhaps this is an artifact of the times, but a book that came out in 2008 has not aged well at all. First, is the abundance of “men writing women” tropes that not only minimize the female characters to minor roles but doesn’t consider that perhaps not everything has to be about sex. Furthermore, while the...
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VIDEO GAME: Mega Man Star Force 2 – Zerker X Saurian (2008)

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Mega Man Star Force 2: Zerker X SaurianYear: 2008Rating: ETime Played: 1,055 minutes / 17.58 hours After playing through the first Mega Man Star Force game, the experience underwhelmed me. I absolutely loved the Mega Man Battle Network games, so I figured this "evolution" of the formula would still keep my interest. Unfortunately, after two games of this, they haven't won me over. Sure, some mechanics that made the Battle Network games fun find a home here in the sequel, but the whole series just feels so far separated from the original series as to not even be related. I think some of what attracted me to the Battle Network series was the link between it and the robot masters of the original series. In the Star Force series, the enemies have either been based on constellations (as in the first game) or mythical creatures (as in this game). Neat themes, sure, but they don't link to my inherent Mega Man nostalgia....
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VIDEO GAME: Chrono Trigger (2008)

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Chrono Trigger Year: 2008 Rating: E10+ Time Played: 34.27 hours I've tried to play through Chrono Trigger for a few decades now. Ever since my family lucked out and found this game in a Super Nintendo bundle at a garage sale, I've played through the first half of this game multiple times. Heck, I even bought it on the Wii virtual console because I had such fond memories of it, despite never having reached the end credits. It wasn't until I bought this game (again) for the Nintendo DS that I could truly appreciate the top-notch game Chrono Trigger from beginning to end. While I definitely appreciated some of the improvements the DS version made to the game (including automatic running and visible health/magic bars), the base game is mostly identical to the SNES version from 1995. What's amazing about this game is how it truly changed the JRPG formula by putting the battles right there on the screen with no cuts or transitions. Additionally,...
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MOVIE: Quantum of Solace (2008)

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Quantum of Solace Year: 2008 Rating: PG-13 Length: 106 minutes / 1.76 hours Ever since the turn of the millennium, many film franchises have taken to starting over; reinventing themselves for this modern era. From superheroes like Batman and Superman to age-old classics such as Rocky and Rambo, these franchises have been going back to the drawing board in order to pull in ticket sales. The James Bond franchise is no different. In 2006, the ranks of Sean Connery, Roger Moore, and Pierce Brosnan gained Daniel Craig as the new James Bond. Quantum of Solace is a rather rare Bond film as it actually has a connection to its predecessor, Casino Royale (2006). It also has all the elements of the franchise. There are the spectacular opening credits, Bond girls, fancy car chases, and gunfights. Somewhat missing from the mix is the legendary set of gadgets, which was also missing from Casino Royale. Instead, an impressive graphical user interface on all the computers and cell...
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VIDEO GAME: LEGO Batman – The Videogame (2008)

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LEGO Batman: The Videogame Year: 2008 Rating: E10+ Time Played: ~30 hours LEGO Batman: The Videogame is a little bizarre because it came out well before The LEGO Movie (2014), where Will Arnett made LEGO Batman his own meme-able character (and eventually starred in his own movie spinoff). It also came out the same year as The Dark Knight (2008), which is arguably the best Batman movie in existence. However, this video game came early enough in the LEGO movie adaptation run in the late-2000s that it still had some of the rough edges that they hadn't smoothed out by later games in the series. This video game doesn't quite fit in the "movie adaptation" formula LEGO had created with hits like LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga. Instead, they seemed to pull from the iconic Batman the Animated Series for the game's episodic structure. We can all be grateful that the Tim Burton Batman films influenced this game much more than the Joel Schumacher...
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VIDEO GAME: Lego Indiana Jones – The Original Adventures (2008)

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Lego Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures Year: 2008 Rating: E10+ Time Played: ~20 hours Indiana Jones is one of those franchises that I enjoyed growing up, but was probably a bit too adult for me. Considering the amount of graphic violence that popped up in these films, it was easy to just "look away" during these intense moments. Heck, I hadn't even seen Temple of Doom (1984) until I had moved out on my own. It then seems weird to me that there would be a Lego video game based on this trilogy that's aimed at older children when the movies themselves probably should have been PG-13. In terms of gameplay, Lego Indiana Jones is still the same fun, simple, and mindless kind of game that encourages multiple play-throughs of the levels to collect all the items from three movies' worth of plot. This felt a bit more tedious in this game when compared to the six-film collection in Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga....
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BOOK: The Time Paradox (2008)

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The Time Paradox Year: 2008 Author: Eoin Colfer Length: 532 minutes / 8.87 hours Just like Godwin’s law asserts that internet conversations eventually lead to comparisons of Hitler, the longer a book series progresses, the more likely it is to include a time travel story. For the Artemis Fowl series, I was glad that it took six books to get here. Unfortunately, this plotline completely stalled the forward momentum the series had developed from the last entry, The Lost Colony (especially with introducing a potential love triangle). Sure, The Time Paradox does set up a revival for bringing back one of the series’ best antagonists, but mostly it is used to highlight the growth of the titular character. Of course, in comparing the old Artemis Fowl with the new one, there seemed to be a regression of the one I had come to enjoy at the end of The Lost Colony. It was almost like he saw how he used to act and thought, “You know, I should try and...
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MOVIE: Doubt (2008)

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Doubt Year: 2008 Rating: PG-13 Length: 104 minutes / 1.73 hours Years before Spotlight (2015) won the Oscar for Best Picture, Doubt (2008) took a hard look at the scandals that have been in the Catholic Church for some time and presented a gripping parable of gossip versus evidence. Aside from this central point, I found Doubt to be a fantastic movie filled with contrasts. The differences between male and female leaders in the Church only heightened the fundamental conflict between Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman’s characters. Add to this the hardline stance of Streep’s Sister Aloysius, who has no flexibility for rules that aren’t actually in the Bible, and the result is an incredible look into changing times. Aside from Streep and Hoffman, Amy Adams and Viola Davis also gave superb performances full of raw and heartfelt emotion. In fact, I’d recommend everyone watch this film just for the career-defining roles of these individuals. Even among these, the intense ambiguity involved with Doubt’s...
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MOVIE: Synecdoche, New York (2008)

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Synecdoche, New YorkYear: 2008Rating: RLength: 124 minutes / 2.07 hours I knew going into Synecdoche, New York (2008), that it was a Charlie Kaufman film. I knew his material could get weird (like Being John Malkovich (1999) and Adaptation. (2002)) but movies like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) had enough heart that I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect. Except nothing could have prepared me for the madness of Synecdoche, New York (2008). I mean, there are meta films like Adaptation. then there are meta films of a whole different level like Synecdoche, New York. In the end, I think the story suffers due to its insistence on the artistic. I’m all for “smart” films that make the audience think. However, I am not a fan of movies that are so intellectually up their own behind to obscure every piece of meaningful plot and character development behind metaphor and “art.” There is a point where the plot gets so convoluted...
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MOVIE: Milk (2008)

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Milk Year: 2008 Rating: R Length: 128 minutes / 2.13 hours It seems like there are biopics for almost every notable person who has done anything significant in the last 50 years. In the case of Milk (2008), we get a peek into the personal, professional, and political life of gay rights activist Harvey Milk (Sean Penn). Unfortunately, as is the case with most biopics, I have found that the titular character is good at enacting societal change but at the cost of their relationship with a significant other. To me, I generally throw my hands up in the air and yell, “Come on!” when this happens since it seems to be ubiquitous with the genre. While I don’t mind watching a film about the activism behind gay rights, I do mind having to watch Sean Penn and James Franco make out. What struck me as odd was a portion of the film where people were encouraged to come out as being homosexual, which a...
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MOVIE: Anvil! The Story of Anvil (2008)

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Anvil! The Story of Anvil Year: 2008 Rating: Not Rated Length: 80 minutes / 1.33 hours Anvil! The Story of Anvil (2008) is one of those movies I sat down to watch because it’s on the 1,001 Movies You Must See Before You Die list. Before watching this film, I honestly had never heard of this Canadian heavy metal band, and it soon became apparent why. What immediately struck me was how similar the premise was to the 1984 mockumentary, This is Spinal Tap. It was difficult to separate this real-life story of the rise and fall of a heavy metal band with the Rob Reiner comedy since so many of the beats of the plot seemed to match up. Still, it was somewhat engrossing to see how Anvil! followed the progression I’d already seen in Spinal Tap. At first, I thought, “Is this for real?” This was before I realized that perhaps the reason why Spinal Tap worked so well was because that’s just how the music industry functions and has functioned...
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BOOK: The Warded Man (2008)

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The Warded Man Year: 2008 Author: Peter V. Brett Length: 453 pages ***THIS BOOK WAS RECEIVED FROM THE PUBLISHER*** For anyone who thinks that fantasy is a childish genre, The Warded Man shows that it can have very adult themes. While this adds an element of realism by including sex and violence, it also means that the intended audience for this book should be mature enough to be able to pay attention. Unfortunately, this book takes a repetitive approach with its character arcs, almost as if writing for children who need the point constantly driven home. In the end, I’m mostly just disappointed at what this book could have been instead of what it was. I’m not sure if there’s a minimum page count/word count for fantasy books, but The Warded Man seems to be an interesting novella, padded out with tons of unnecessary backstory—or at least backstory that could be covered in a relevant line or paragraph when needed. I did like the concept and the magical system in...
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BOOK: Alcatraz Versus the Scrivener’s Bones (2008)

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Alcatraz Versus the Scrivener’s Bones Year: 2008 Author: Brandon Sanderson Length: 425 minutes / 7.08 hours Earlier this year, I read Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians and absolutely loved it. Consequently, I had high hopes for the next book in this series, Alcatraz Versus the Scrivener’s Bones. While there was still the same amount of self-awareness and humor in this book, it felt a little…off. Perhaps I should have read these two books closer together, but I had some trouble coming up to speed in the beginning and wasn’t entirely sure why the “goal” of this book was to find Alcatraz’s father. In any case, Sanderson’s world-building is still in top form here. Of course, the “cute” way that this series was self-aware when I read the first book was a bit more annoying this time around. It almost felt like every chapter had to have a soliloquy, even if it didn’t link itself to where the plot was at the time—which often broke the...
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BOOK: Ender in Exile (2008)

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Ender in Exile Year: 2008 Author: Orson Scott Card Length: 823 minutes / 13.72 hours When it comes to the Ender saga, I was excited to read the direct sequel to Ender’s Game, Ender in Exile. After all, Speaker for the Dead was set so far after the events in Ender’s Game that there was a distinct division between the first book in the series and the following three (almost like The Hobbit when compared to The Lord of the Rings). And yet, while there was a huge gap between the first two books of the Ender saga, there was enough explanation about what had happened between them that Ender in Exile seemed a little unnecessary. My biggest problem with this book was that I haven’t started on the Shadow spinoff series, so a lot of the revelations presented in this book essentially spoiled those books for me. If you’re wondering when to read Ender in Exile, I’d suggest reading Ender’s Game, followed by the Shadow saga, and then read this book before continuing to the end of the Ender saga with Speaker for the Dead. I’ll still read...
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MOVIE: In Bruges (2008)

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In Bruges Year: 2008 Rating: R Length: 107 minutes / 1.78 hours It’s interesting to see Martin McDonagh’s first film with the hindsight of his two other movies. While I missed In Bruges (2008) back when it came out, I have recently enjoyed Seven Psychopaths (2012) and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017). Having now seen all three of McDonagh’s films, I see the themes and motifs he uses throughout his directing. I already had hints of these common elements; it’s just that seeing In Bruges for the first time has cemented them. From using short people to drug use to some uncomfortable violence, McDonagh has a style all his own, and it clearly shows in his breakout film. I think what draws me to McDonagh’s films is his expert use of multiple “Chekov’s Guns” as well as tying all these various foreshadowings together in a satisfying way. Whether it’s a fat American, spare change, or the untimely death of a child, each part of In Bruges was included for a purpose that becomes evident...
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BOOK: The Brass Verdict (2008)

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The Brass Verdict Year: 2008 Author: Michael Connelly Length: 681 minutes / 11.35 hours Another book, another trial for the Lincoln Lawyer. While I appreciated the stand-alone nature of this book, I also liked that knowledge of the events in the first book of this sub-series helped to provide context for the challenges Mickey Haller now faces. The main case of this novel was pretty predictable, especially if you read into the insinuation of the title. I would have liked a little more attention on the side-case surrounding the death of Haller’s lawyer colleague. It seemed to be more of a Harry Bosch story, though, so I can understand why the focus was on Haller’s case. Once again, Michael Connelly creates an easily readable series of events that unfold in the courtroom. Some twists at the end were exciting developments but were definitely easily guessed if the reader was paying attention. There’s almost a guilty pleasure in following Haller along as he embeds that reasonable doubt...
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BOOK: Double Share (2008)

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Double Share Year: 2008 Author: Nathan Lowell Length: 308 pages Much like Half Share overcompensated for Quarter Share’s naïveté, I found Double Share to take an extreme stance on the dynamic of a ship’s crew. This stance was practically diametrically opposed to the crew of Ishmael Wang’s first crew aboard the Lois McKendrick. While it might sound like I’m complaining about this, I’m actually lauding Nathan Lowell for finally creating a crew that’s a little more realistic than the idyllic one he used during the first three books in this series. Of course, it would have been nice to intersperse difficult characters throughout the books, instead of having to deal with them all at once, but it is what it is. Even though the first three books in this series were fairly close together in timeframes, I would have liked a little more detail given to the handful of years dedicated to Wang’s time at the Academy, especially since the end of Full Share made...
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MOVIE: Get Smart (2008)

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Get Smart Year: 2008 Rating: PG-13 Length: 110 minutes / 1.83 hours While film adaptations of television shows aren't new, Get Smart (2008) was certainly in the era when the idea to do so had become popular (even if we're still trying to forget Bewitched (2005)). What's nice about Get Smart is that it falls into that "self-aware" category, mainly because the source material (i.e. the 1960's TV show of the same name) was already self-aware when it came to the "spy" genre made popular by James Bond. Of course, it's no wonder that the king of parody, Mel Brooks was involved in both the TV show and this film adaptation. Of course, while the humor was more bathroom-oriented than witty, many of Carell's lines played off of the amusing nature of taking everything literally. Also, the bumbling nature of his new field agent character, Maxwell Smart, was certainly entertaining (as it is clearly Carell's forté), even if it was abandoned at times to advance the plot through...
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